shifting
by Snow Glows Blue
Summary: "You are unsettled, still," Tharkay says, quietly. "I hardly think that is the most relevant topic of conversation," Laurence replies, because he can think of nothing else to say. "...But yes, I am." (Daemon AU, Laurence/Tharkay)


_William Laurence, 1791 (17 years old)_

Laurence makes lieutenant at seventeen, after his daemon has taken the form of a perfectly inoffensive grey tabby cat and the captain who recommended him has breathed a long sigh of relief — he could have managed it with a bird or a dog, or possibly even with a snake, but you simply cannot be a Navy man with a moose for a daemon.

Which is why Laurence is so scared of what will happen when Elaine _actually_ settles. She may take the form of a grey tabby in public, but when it is only the two of them alone she is a field mouse, a tree frog, a red fox, a swallow. While all of the forms she still takes are small enough that it might not matter, there is a certain anxiety knowing full well that within the year everyone will know that he _lied._

There is nothing that can be done about it now, of course, except to ask Elaine if it wouldn't be possible for her to just settle like this, which Laurence has already tried.

("I don't think I'll settle for a while," she said in response, and it was both a new source of fear and a sweet relief.)

* * *

 _John Granby, 1794 (14 years old)_

"I need you to settle as a bird, Kells."

Kelsey looks dubious, which is - about what Granby had expected, actually; he's tried out bird forms before, but never for any extended period of time, and never without Granby begging him to. But aviator captains have bird daemons, that's just how it works, and Granby's chances of ever making captain are slim enough as it is.

"It won't be enough," Kelsey says. He's a cicada right now. He likes insectoid forms best, as much as Granby wishes that he didn't. "You're still a first-generation aviator. _They_ wouldn't promote you to captain if I were an eagle."

It's an argument they've had before. Granby responds as he always does: "Yes, so we can't afford to hurt our chances." The Aerial Corps claims that its captains are chosen by merit rather than by daemon form, except in "clear cases of impossibility," but John knows better.

In any case that isn't how settling goes, or else nobody would ever end up with snakes or spiders or mosquitoes, and both Granby and Kelsey know it. Kelsey just sighs. "I'll try and make sure that we can keep flying," he says, which is no reassurance at all.

Granby takes it anyway. What else can he do?

* * *

 _Tenzing Tharkay, 1798 (25 years old)_

When Tharkay was younger and more idealistic, he wanted Asmita to settle as something admired: a lion, a wolf, a bird of prey. He would have been perfectly happy with a dog or a cat, of course, you can't hold your breath and pray for a tiger — but if his soul could have settled in the kind of form that everyone hopes for, there would be nobody who could argue that he didn't belong in England.

Now, miles into the desert, with his deepest heart in the form of a golden eagle on his shoulder, Tharkay could laugh at his own naïveté. They would have argued that no matter what.

* * *

 _William Laurence, 1805 (31 years old)_

Before meeting Lieutenant Dayes, Elaine shifts into the form of a kestrel and perches on Temeraire's shoulder. It isn't like having a human touch her — Tom Riley tripped over once, and Laurence had thought that he was dying — but it's a claim on Temeraire all the same. Dayes's eyes narrow when he sees it.

Temeraire makes enough of a fuss that the two of them are not separated. Laurence arrives in the Loch Laggan covert with Elaine a kestrel on his shoulder, knowing full well that he is going to be disliked here — and his knowledge does not fail him; Lieutenant Granby seems to hate him nearly on sight.

Once Laurence sees Captain Rankin for what he is, of course, he cannot blame him. He seeks Granby out after the incident with Victoriatus, but Granby manages to beat him to the apology — "I can see you love your Temeraire," Granby says, "and I've been being unreasonable — can we get another chance?"

It is _excellent,_ Laurence thinks, later, to have a friend here. He almost hadn't noticed how much he had missed the feeling.

* * *

 _Tenzing Tharkay, 1808 (35 years old)_

When Tharkay finds the place where Laurence has made camp, Laurence's daemon is flying anxious circles around her human's tent. Asmita has been silent since they found Laurence in his gaol cell, and she does not speak now, but Elaine flies over to them. Tharkay ducks to avoid touching her, but she lands on his arm, nuzzles against Tharkay's shoulder in a gesture that could not be anything but purposeful.

For a moment Tharkay stands there, shocked, but only a moment. Then he follows Elaine wordlessly into the tent.

Laurence's face is openly, desperately raw. Tharkay holds Elaine close to his chest, lets Asmita rest on his shoulder, tries to be as gentle with Laurence's daemon as he can. "Laurence," he says, and he knows his voice is broken, "what are you _doing?"_

* * *

 _John Granby, 1811 (31 years old)_

He'd known since the voyage to China that there was something odd about Laurence's daemon, from the looks that Captain Riley gave Laurence and from Laurence's obvious discomfort around his former colleagues.

Still, it's a shock to find out for certain, even if he wasn't meant to.

Riley approaches Granby on the dragon deck of the _Allegiance_ at night, when Iskierka is blessedly asleep. "Do you know how long Laurence's daemon has been a kestrel?" he asks, as if there were any way that Granby would know that. Granby only has a moment to think _I met him when in the year five, I have no idea when he settled_ before Riley continues, "Because when I knew him in the year four, she was a cat."

In the year four, Laurence would have been thirty. Granby has never heard of anyone's daemon still shifting past the age of nineteen, and he has done quite a bit of looking into it — he remained hopeful for nearly a full year after Kelsey settled as a wolf spider.

"She's been a kestrel for as long as I've known him," Granby says, and follows it up with, "I'm the only aviator captain I know of whose daemon isn't a bird, of course," as if that were a reasonable explanation.

Riley looks nearly as dubious as Granby feels. "Well, thank you anyway," Riley says, and claps him on the shoulder. "Don't tell him that I asked?"

Granby wasn't going to. He agrees anyway.

* * *

 _William Laurence, 1812 (38 years old)_

They hurt Asmita.

General Fela's men _hurt Asmita._

Laurence has not left Tharkay's side since finding him, and this new revelation only strengthens that resolve; he had thought he was dying when Riley _tripped_ over Elaine, so the idea of purposefully hurting another person's soul — of anyone touching his Tharkay at _all —_

Asmita sits on a perch in the corner of the tent, her head tucked under one wing. Elaine curls up in his lap in the form of a clouded leopard; the surgeons do not care what form his daemon takes, and Tharkay is unconscious, and there is nobody else who might see, and Laurence likes the weight of her.

Which, of course, means that when Tharkay wakes, there is no time for Elaine to shift back into the shape of a kestrel. Laurence is not sure that he would have wanted her to do so in any case, but Tharkay's eyes narrow on her, he still feels uncomfortably watched.

"You are unsettled, still," Tharkay says, quietly.

"I hardly think that is the most relevant topic of conversation," Laurence replies, because he can think of nothing else to say. "...But yes, I am."

Tharkay shifts on the narrow bed, and winces at the motion. Laurence moves closer to him. "I have not forgotten that night in Shoeburyness," Tharkay says. Both of them know exactly what he is referring to. "I remember how much you must have trusted me, I wanted to repay the favor —" He laughs. "I do not think I can do it, now."

That takes Laurence a moment to decode, but when he does — "Of course, of course," he says, at the same moment as Elaine says "You know that we would never ask," and Tharkay smiles, a little weak.

"Of course you wouldn't," he says, looking at Elaine. He turns his head to look Laurence in the eyes. "Stay with me a little longer?"

Laurence bows his head, and nods, and stays. It is all that he can do.


End file.
